The Finals, the free-to-play online multiplayer FPS game, has officially been released concurrently with this year’s TGA. Read our review to see what it did well, what it didn't do well, and if it's worth buying.
The Finals Review Overview
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Fun, Fresh, and Original Great Graphics Excellent Customization | A Lot More Fun With Friends |
The Finals Overall Score - 86/100
The Finals is an excellent free-to-play online FPS game. It’s loads of fun, features unique FPS gameplay, good graphics, a unique art style, decent audio, and is truly free-to-play. What more could you ask for?
The Finals Story - 8/10
Like most online multiplayer FPS games, The Finals is light on story, which is totally fine. The story of the game is that there’s a televised combat game show where competitors fight to try and win cash prizes. You’re a competitor, and so are your teammates and opponents.
The Finals Gameplay - 9/10
The Finals’ gameplay is unique. It’s a team-based game with great gunplay, a long time-to-kill (TTK), destructible environments, unique objective based game modes, build and loadout customization, and more. This game is fun, innovative, and has the potential to blow up as the next big multiplayer shooter.
The Finals Visuals - 9/10
The game looks fantastic on the highest settings and decent on the lowest settings, which is what most people would be on for that extra boost to their frames per second. Character designs, cosmetics, maps, special effects, and everything else all look great. Very nice looking game, but isn’t quite on par with the jaw-dropping spectacle and breathtaking visuals of other games.
The Finals Audio - 7/10
The game sounds totally fine. Voice lines, gunfire sounds, explosions, etc. are nice, but won’t exactly blow your socks off. The Finals is pretty average when it comes to audio, but what takes it up a notch is the entertaining and over-the-top announcer that talks throughout the match.
The Finals Value For Money - 10/10
The game is completely free-to-play and only takes up less than 8GB of your storage. It’s a quality free-to-play game with the complete absence of pay-to-win microtransactions.
The Finals Review | The Next Big FPS
The Finals is finally here after its announcement last year and boy does it not disappoint. The Finals is about a televised combat game show where you as a player are a participant. Gameplay feels like if you got all the good things about Call of Duty, Overwatch, and Rainbow Six Siege and smooshed them all together. You’ll get great gunplay like in Call of Duty or Battlefield, Abilities and objective-based game modes like in Overwatch, and the gadgets, tactical gameplay, and destructible (and somewhat constructible) environment like in Rainbow Six Siege.
Players can choose between Light, Medium, and Heavy character types, with the health bars, movement, character models, and choices for weapons, gadgets, and specializations (abilities) changing per character type you choose. The Light builds are your prototypical agile DPS role, the medium builds are well-rounded fighters or supportive characters, while the heavy builds are your heavy hitting tanks. There’s probably a build you can make that fits exactly how you want to play, be it quick and agile, slow and strategic, or somewhere in between.
There are currently two game modes, but we’ll focus on the main one, which is called Cashout. In Cashout, you’ll compete to complete objectives by opening vaults and taking them to cash-out locations. It’s a lot like capture the flag and works perfectly for this type of game. Teams will often find themselves converging on the objectives, leading to non-stop action filled fun.
The gadgets, specializations, and environment behavior in this game is what makes it stand out from other shooters. This opens up the possibilities when it comes to strategy, and you can get really creative with it. You could get to a point by blowing off the roof and entering through there, or destroy the floor beneath the objective to make it fall right on you. You could set up a turret to help you defend yourself when cashing out, or block off entry points with solidifying goo. The possibilities are endless in The Finals.
Pros of The Finals
| Things The Finals Got Right |
|---|
|
Fun, Fresh, and Original Great Graphics Excellent Customization |
Fun, Fresh, and Original
The Finals is loads of fun thanks to its excellent gunplay and tactical gameplay. Thanks to its customizable loadouts, creative gadgets, destructible environment, and game changing specializations, it feels like there’s an endless amount of possibilities you could approach a situation. You could throw a smoke grenade that turns you and your teammates invisible and then rush the objective for a surprising ambush, make a bridge using the goo gun, or unleash a barrage of explosives and flashbangs before swooping in to finish them off.
Great Graphics
The Finals holds its own visually as a game made in 2023. It looks surreal, and especially on the highest setting. However, most people don’t have the hardware for that, and even if they do, they’re more likely to go low or medium to improve their frames per second. Even on low settings the game looks good, and that says a lot. Characters, weapons, special effects, maps, and cosmetics all look great.
Excellent Customization
Loadout customization is great in this game as you can most likely make a build that’s perfect for you and your playstyle. You’ll have the option to choose between light, medium, and heavy builds. The light builds are small, fast, agile, but they die quickly. They have access to weapons befitting this fast-paced character type like SMGs, sniper rifles, swords, knives, sawed-off shotgun, and more. The medium builds can play as well-rounded fighters or more of a supportive playstyle. They have access to a variety of equipment, weapons, and specializations befitting these two types of playstyles, like assault rifles, turrets, shotguns, and a revolver. Finally, the heavy builds are like the tanks of this game. They’re slow, but they’re pretty hard to take down. They have access to a variety of things that fit this type of playstyle like machine guns, rocket launchers, shields, and the like.
Cons of The Finals
| Things That The Finals Can Improve |
|---|
|
A Lot More Fun With Friends |
A Lot More Fun With Friends
As the sole noteworthy con of this game, it’s not really meant to be played with random people. Given how tactical the game is and how important it is to play as a team, it’d be so much better to play with a premade squad rather than random people, who, more often than not, don’t communicate at all and do their own thing. While you could still have fun doing your own thing without any communication with your team, teamwork actually does make the dream work. This can be a pro if you’re squadding up with your friends, but that’s just a luxury that some people simply don’t have.
The Finals Overview & Premise
The Finals lets you partake in a televised game show where competitors fight for glory and money. Teams of three would partake in these Hunger Games and Gladiator inspired battles. In this show, teams would blow open vaults and then cash-out the contents in stations around the map, all while fighting off the other teams who aim to do the same.
The Finals FAQ
Does The Finals feature crossplay between PS5, Xbox, and PC?
Yes, the finals features crossplay across all platforms.
What are the best weapons in The Finals?
Every weapon in The Finals is viable, and you could make anything work. However, the weapons that elite players are using now are the V9S, SA1216, FCAR, SR-84, CL-40, and XP-54.
Game8 Reviews
The Finals Product Information
 |
|
| Title | THE FINALS |
|---|---|
| Release Date | December 8, 2023 |
| Developer | Embark Studios |
| Publisher | Embark Studios |
| Supported Platforms | PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S |
| Genre | FPS, Action |
| Number of Players | Multiplayer (9-12) |
| ESRB Rating | Rating Pending |
| Official Website | The Finals Website |
